A Glimpse into my Life.

So a couple of days turned into a few weeks. I seriously had intentions to post but somehow it kept getting pushed back further and further. Now, the kidlets are in bed, I've done enough housework to placate that inner urge, and I'm blogging. :D



Easter was nice. We spent it with Hubby's family and Jake came with us. He's a wonderful sport. Kelli and I hid Easter eggs in the in-laws back yard and then turned the kids loose. Jake took Pink Princess around and they were quite the cute duo. I did learn something though. Don't let baby drool mix with Easter egg dye. Jake gave Pink Princess an egg with her name on it. She drooled on the egg and it stained her onsie pink. Of course she had to taste test everything!



Rynie was so proud of his Easter eggs! We almost couldn't hide them because he had to show them off and admire his coloring skills.



Just because I think this is totally adorable:



Rynie is so cute. He was telling us about his Church class Sunday. He told us about Jesus and how He loves us, and since He loves us He let them put nails in His hands (both of them) and His feet. Then He died. They waited three days and then He left His place and showed people the holes. He was alive again! And did you know Jesus loves us? What a cute little guy. Rynie was so happy to tell us all about Easter and the Resurrection. I just love that little guy.




In other news, my aunt gave me her old serger. It's 20+ years old and a White model. I took it in and had it serviced and it works wonderfully. It is making things go so much faster!

Pink Princess's dress is coming along. I didn't finish but I did a bit of work. I actually ended up sewing some of the snaps on the slip on backwards TWICE so it was time to take a break. I was trying to sew while monitoring Rynie with scissors and evidently that didn't work too well this time.

The Regency Short Stays I was working on have had issues. Mainly I have issues. I have dropped enough of the pregnancy weight that by the time I finished the set I was working on, they were way too huge. They were fitted beautifully a few weeks ago. So I cut out my normal size and I still have to take them in a decent amount in the side seam. I think I may try to go down one more size and try again. I hope to finish them before the end of this week so that I can start on my clothes for London and Bath.

And here is the surprise I was talking about before! I am now the proud owner of a treadle sewing machine! I have to do a bit of cleaning on it, but that's fine with me. Everything works on it and I am so excited to get it cleaned and up and running!





Good Night and Sweet Dreams to everyone!

I was almost the proud owner of a complete, leather bound, 2nd edition of Jane Austen's works! Drat. My parents were at an estate auction looking for furniture for their new house and 2 sets of Jane's works were up. The bidding went for more than they were willing to spend, but they did think of me! Oh if only... A girl can still dream though. Hopefully next time the opportunity arises I will be that lucky girl!

My brother, Jakie, and I took my kidlets to New Mexico last week. It was quite the experience taking the kids without Hubby, and I think it was an eye opener for Jakie on how to travel with kids. We had to stop in Wellington so Rynie could do #2. We had to stop in Green River so Pink Princess could eat. We had to stop in Moab so we could get dinner, do potty breaks, feed Pink Princess her baby food, and let her blow out a diaper. Lets just say that I think I now know how to feed her traveling. I left her belted into her car seat, swaddled her from chub to toes, kept her arms in it, and then topped her off with a bib. There was only minimal mess and it worked pretty well. Then we had to stop in Dove Creek because we had to do the kiddo bathroom, baby needs food and a new bummy thing. Boy howdy I thought we were never going to get to New Mexico. Little did I know...

We were both born down there and have visited frequently....you'd think that Jakie, aka Boy Wonder would know how to get there....right, you'd think. He wanted to go the La Plata way to get to Farmington. I said okay, sure, I don't care. Well, we turned off at the McPhee Reservoir and then at the spot where you can go to Delores or Aztec, we went to Delores. Then, instead of watching for the turn off to head towards Durango, Jake went through Delores. And we kept going and going. Not really sure where we were going but hey, we were going to get there fast. We found the quaint, picturesque (I'm sure, can't be certain as it was dark but on a senic) town of Rico, Colorado. We finally had cell reception and called Old Man Rivers. He told us to turn around and head back but for Jakie to not miss the turn like he did before. Our trip took over 9 hours by the time we got to Old Man Rivers (OMR) place. Boy was I glad for a bed by then.

Chatty Cathy (Rynie) didn't give it up until 10:30 that night. Then he woke up when we unloaded at OMR's house at midnight. I finally had to tell Rynie at 1:30 that morning to go to sleep or OMR would ride diggers without him. Boy he went to sleep fast. Would that work for Christmas, do you think?



Rynie got to ride the diggers with Jakie and OMR. It was the highlight of his trip, TWICE, the lucky Monkey! When we first showed up at OMR's house for the night Rynie kept telling me, "Thank you so much for bringing me to Ranny's house, am just love you so much. I'm am so happy we are at Ranny's house. Can we ride diggers now?"





We went to Grey Kitty's house the next morning and surprised her! She didn't see Jakie and Rynie walk past her window, but she saw me and Pink Princess. She stood there with her mouth gaping open and I haven't seen her hustle that fast to the door in a long time. We spent the time hanging out, and having a good time. We got to go to Brooklet's track meet and watch her take 1st in Triple Jump and a 4x4 Relay. It was a nice week all in all.


I learned a few things on this trip:

#1- Co-sleeping with a traveling (around the bed) infant is not the smartest option. Especially when they are sleep kickers.

#2- Both of my kids talk in their sleep. AND they talk to each other while sleeping. Go kidlets!

#3- Even if you are too cheap to buy a highchair for Great Grandma's house, you need at least one more outfit to change into, preferably a hazmat suit or else you do lots of laundry.


(gives you an idea why)

#4- Threatening to strap your cousin to the hood of your car for the duration of the ride home is an effective way to get him to finally put on his seat belt. Telling him you'll laugh if he eats bugs while he's at it makes him move faster.


•••• On to the Farrier appointment this past Tuesday. ••••
I had a Farrier appointment Tuesday and so about 30 minutes beforehand I was in the field trying to catch Pinto and Dolly. It was a nice, windy sort of day and the horses and cows were acting like 'wild' animals. After Steve (Farrier) and I tried for 30 minutes to catch the nags, I finally got a hold of Dolly. Normally if I grab her mane, she bobs her head then gives it up and I can put a halter on her. This time, she bobbed her head then threw it. I was holding on enough that it send me sailing through the air and rolling to a stop. I landed on my keys and it set the car alarm off. Both kids were in the car and it freaked Rynie out enough that he figured out how to get his car seat unbuckled, crawled into the front seat since he couldn't open the child locks, unlocked the car, and was trucking it screaming down the road. I had to catch him, shut off the car alarm and calm the kids down. After that I said to Heck with those two we were going to do Misty and Storm and who cares. Steve agreed, but said next time I wanted to Rodeo I needed to let him know so that he could watch me fly. Misty and Storm were great. They let Rynie mess around with them all he wanted and we were done in about 30 minutes with them.

Today was the make up appointment for Dolly and Pinto. Pinto was amicable to the grain I brought and Dolly decided her stunt last time worked well so she thought about it again. I wasn't going to hang on this time though. I ended up putting the rope on the ground in front of the grain bucket and then when she came to eat I caught her. Dang she's strong because she tried to drag me. Steve again told me I need to warn him of Rodeos. Hubby came and held Dolly which was good since she didn't want to mind.

Rynie wanted to ride his red horse today so I put him up on Pinto bareback and he had two fistfuls of mane but he stayed on. He was hunkered over to the point of laying down, but he had a blast!

Off to do something since Hubby is at school tonight and I am bored.

I didn't intend to take a break from blogging, but we have been crazy sick in our house. Rynie brought something home from somewhere and it was a viral nasty. He got it a lot worse than the rest of us. We all just had coughs and colds of never ending nastiness. Rynie ended up with a nice raised rash to compliment the rest of it.



The doctor thought he had Fifth's Disease, but since his rash was raised, it wasn't. In the end, the doctor told us we could pay to have lab work done and find out but since he was clearly on the mend, he didn't recommend it. We went with no lab work. Our sniffles have mainly cleared up now.

The Pink Princess is growing like a weed. She is getting to be extremely mobile also. She keeps trying and trying to crawl, but just can't quite do it. Pink Princess will square up, start rocking and suddenly scoot backwards. It drives her absolutely crazy. She is trying to be a big girl, but she still can't quite sit up yet. When she does sit up, she gets excited and then falls over laughing. Here she is after she wedged herself under Great-Grandma Grey Kitty's table.



Rynie has been my little buddy. We have been reading lots of books and playing in the mud/dirt in the back yard. He was so excited that the first nice day we went out to play (read: wouldn't sink in the mud) he was rolling in the dirt.





I have started taking Rynie horseback riding. He loves being a cowboy and moving his Uncle Jakie's cattle and Grandma Floolie's mule.



I've been working on the dress for Pink Princess. After I got most of the dress put together, the trims I had thought would be cute just didn't cut it. I found some lace in my stash and I'm going to trim it with that. I just have to put buttons and hem the dress and slip then it's done. Hopefully by this weekend I will be done or else Pink Princess may be too big for it soon.

The little sister of one of my childhood friends is getting married next month. She asked me to do her hair and makeup for her bridals and wedding. I am so excited. She is actually wearing my wedding dress and my veil/circlet so it's an interesting trip down memory lane. I can't wait to do what she is wanting for her pictures. She is such a sweet girl and adorable.



Well, off to bed. I'll have to post Saturday when I finish Pink Princess's dress and my new *surprise* but it's actually not a surprise for me, just a surprise from anyone else! I just don't want to post about it before I can add a picture with it!

Some of the ladies on the S&S boards were talking about curly, long haired styles and different ways to do them and I thought, hey, I have long, curly hair...why not? So over the next little while I'll post a few pictures of hairstyles I do to manage the curls but not do the messy bun look.

**Disclaimer to start, this is working with my hair at the very end of the day in dry winter weather. I have a few weird curl issues going on due to my hair loses some of the curl while I'm pregnant, but as soon as I'm not it starts growing in super curly again. You get to see a few different degrees of curly on my hair! **

Step one:
I start with my hair hanging free and let it part wherever it wants to. I sprayed a bit of lavender water on it to tame some of the frizzies that have accumulated during the day.






Step two:
Take a small section of hair from the front side section and do a gentle twist to it. Secure with a bobby pin.



Repeat on the other side! ;)

Step three:
Move down to the section just in front of the ears. Do the same type of small twist and pin it as in Step two. Don't take too much because if you do, it'll pull too tightly to the head. All you are wanting is for it to gently hold the hair in place.



Step four:
Take a small section of hair on each side right below the base of the ear. Make sure that the hair falling down between the two sections is loose. You want it to puff gently.



Then tie the two pieces in a little knot. Keep the ends out. Secure by cross hatching bobby pins through part of the knot.





Step five:
Drop down a little further and repeat Step four with a slight modification. Instead of just going up and tying the knot, cross the strands under the remaining hair then go on the topside and tie it. It helps to keep the hair contained and fly aways are minimized.







That's it for now! Hopefully more sewing updates and a new hairstyle tomorrow!

I have started making a dress for the Pink Princess. This came about after dithering back and forth for a while then deciding to jump in and cut something out before I could change my mind. The pattern is New Look 6575. I read through the directions and decided to cut out the medium size since Pink Princess is almost out of the small size already. Then it said to cut out pattern pieces 1, 4, 5 and 9. Easy enough right? I cut them out and did the stay stitching on the neckline. Then I started putting it together according to the directions. If you just go off of reading the directions, you are in massive amounts of trouble! It said to do something for making a bow that wasn't listed on the pattern piece list!! I went back and re-read it and no that wasn't there. No big deal seeing as I didn't want a bow on the dress anyway. Then I started on the sleeves. There was nothing about an armband (piece 6) in the above list of pieces. So after that, I went through all the pieces and cut out anything that was for dress view A. Turns out they forgot to mention the slip skirt pieces as well. After that I decided that I know how to put together a dress so I'm just going to go for it. I have the dress bodice put together and the sleeves finished and attached. I have the slip bodice put together and the slip skirt just needs to be gathered and hooked to the bodice. Then I need to put everything together. A good task for when Hubby is at school or working on homework.



Now I am trying to decide on the trim for her dress. I *think* I have it narrowed down to two. At least I do until I have the dress and slip put together. Who knows if one of them screams 'pick me, pick me!' Any comments or thoughts are welcome to which one looks better with her dress! :)

The Pink Princess is getting chubbier and cuter every day! Along with that, she has become more demanding. She loves to eat so much that tonight she found the spatula from Rynie's toy kitchen and she was trying to feed herself. It finally made her mad enough that even though it was not dinnertime we fed her anyway. She loves to be involved in everything. The other day I was folding laundry on my bed and she schooched over to the hangers and this was the result!



Needless to say, I had a good chuckle over this and took a picture then I disentangled her and put her into her bed.

Rynie is a huge helper. He has been helping me clean my sewing room so I can start on a massive sewing marathon between now and the time I go on the Historical Costume Tour being done by Sense and Sensibility in September. You can tell he hangs out with his Mom a lot because he 'made' the Pink Princess a 'skirt' while I was cleaning. It consisted of unraveling spools of thread (his own personal spools) and using kitchen scissors to cut up scraps of fabric and rearranging them according to his whims. I wish I had a picture, but I forgot to charge the camera.

Rynie's imagination is amazing. Everyday he is a different 'guy.' Cooker guy, Banker guy, Worker guy, Army guy, Cowboy, Train guy, the list goes on and on. Some days he is Wall•E or the Kung Fu Panda. Usually the Pink Princess and I end up corrallating to what he is. When he is Wall•E, I am Eve and the Pink Princess is Baby Eve. If he is a Cowboy, she is his Deputy and I am his Sidekick.




Since I am going to Bath for the Jane Austen Festival after the Costume Tour, I have been figuring out my wardrobe for the Regency Promenade. I want to try and do it only with fabrics in my stash, and I think I have it all worked out! I will be using the Sense and Sensibility patterns for the chemise, ELC gathered bodiced dress, and a Spencer/Pelisse. I haven't decided which corset pattern I'll use since I have the S&S one, La Mode Bagatelle bodiced petticoat, and the Mantua Maker corset. I'm trying to narrow that down right now though. I'm also thinking about making the gown from page 44 of Patterns of Fashion: 1 and Hubby is trying to help me scale it up. Pictures to follow as soon as I can take them.

Other than that, life is somewhat settling down. We think we have a buyer for my Mom's car, he's coming Monday to make the offer. We hope he takes it, so we can concentrate on 'normal' life. I also have to straighten out some of her banking things and take the kidlets passport application and pictures in so we can get the ball rolling.